


Careless Heart

by dinkitandrhinkit



Category: Rhett & Link
Genre: Bittersweet, F/M, First Time, Fluff and Angst, Guilt, Infidelity, Internalized Homophobia, M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-12-28
Updated: 2017-12-28
Packaged: 2019-02-23 01:44:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,788
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13179723
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dinkitandrhinkit/pseuds/dinkitandrhinkit
Summary: It started when they were 16.It ended when Link said "I do".Or did it?A story with two endings, sort of like a choose your own adventure, but for heartbreak.





	Careless Heart

The first time it happened, they were 16. They’d been hanging out by the river, enjoying the summer sun. They’d not yet waded into the rushing water, but they would soon, the sun getting higher into the sky and causing the air to grow more humid and stifling. The two best friends sat, side by side, laughing and joking about nothing, as they’d done a million times before.

Eventually, they stripped off to their boxers and jumped into the cool water. The cold sucked all the air from their bodies, but they soon relaxed into the frigid stream. They swam for a while, splashing and racing, before becoming tired and retiring back to the bank, this time to their secluded island.

They flopped down, allowing the warm air to evaporate the water droplets from their tanning skin. They began to talk of the upcoming holidays and the end of the school year. Talk turned, as it inevitably did, to their various classmates, specifically the girls. They were planning who their girlfriends of the summer might be.

“Jenny’s really grown this year, if you know what I mean,” Rhett said with a waggle of his eyebrows.

“I know what you mean,” Link demonstrated his understanding with a crude hand gesture. They both giggled.

“The things I’d do to her if I had the chance,” Rhett said wistfully. Link knew that Rhett hadn’t gotten past second base with a girl, but he didn’t comment, knowing how Rhett felt when it came to the subject of girls.

The combination of the heat and the talk of the various girls they’d their eyes on had them getting worked up. Neither would later be able to explain how and why, but before they knew it, they were both hard and overheating.

Hands started clutching, groping through fabric. Grunts and high pitched whines joined the buzzing of the summer insects and rush of the water. The boys thrust against each other, Rhett’s larger, gangly body pushing Link into the soft earth. Neither had disrobed, neither had dared.

The pace was frantic. Eyes were screwed shut, trying desperately to ignore the reality of who they were senselessly rutting against.

As young, inexperienced men, it didn’t take long for them to come, sticky and hot in their underwear.

“I’m not gay, bo.”

“No way, brother. Me neither.”

“That didn’t mean anything.”

“Of course not.”

Things were awkward for the week afterwards, finding excuses not to touch, not to look each other in the eye. They had always been ridiculed for their close friendship. Now, the taunts cut deeper, each word burrowing into their psyche, fuelling their self-loathing.

They spent the summer apart, each busy with their respective girlfriends. But some nights, when the hormones overtook their bodies, pumping through their veins like water down the river, they relived that day. After the ecstasy and the sweat had cooled, the shame and guilt made them sick to their stomachs.

How could they live with the sin, the shame of what they had done?

* * *

 

After that summer, things reverted to how it had always been. That day had become almost a mirage in the heat of the summer. Life moved on.

Until Link met Christy.

The boys had been at college for a while. Living together had been fun, if not a little fraught with tension that each man had attributed to living with another person outside their family for the first time. Link’s pathological cleanliness got on Rhett’s nerves and Rhett’s slack attitude to study got on Link’s, but they spent enough time apart to cool off, and not fight too much.

When Link met Christy, Rhett had been single for 6 months. It was the longest he’d been single since the age of 16. He was getting antsy, horny and gruff. Sharing his dorm room meant less privacy than he needed to be able to relieve the stress as often as he had back home.

Link had come home from his date with Christy, happy and kiss drunk. Rhett hadn’t had a second to take care of business in over a week and his skin was crawling with desire.

Christy, being a good Christian girl, hadn’t let Link get further than first base and he didn’t mind. He understood, being a good Christian boy himself. But he’d be lying if he said he wasn’t a little fired up after their make out sessions.

He told her he was waiting too. He couldn’t tell her the truth. He’d never told a soul.

After three months of Rhett looking at Link’s kiss bruised lips, radiant smile and half erections after each successful date, the madness seized him.

Before they knew it, they were wrestling on the ground, as they had so many times before. This time though, they could feel the other, hot and hard against them and soon there were rough kisses and carpet burns as they rubbed against each other.

This time, hands explored under clothes, still not brave enough to take them off, but simply dry humping wasn’t enough anymore. The touching and kissing was unlike last time, which had been infinitely more clinical, detached and impersonal.

Eyes still didn’t open, couldn’t bear to bear witness to their sin, but this time in the silence of their tiny box of a dorm room, the moans and scents were unmistakable.

Lying in the aftermath, still breathing heavily, Link had confessed that he loved her.

“That’s great man. Congrats, Neal.” A best friend should be able to be excited when his blood brother found a beautiful, sweet woman to be with. And he was excited. Rhett liked Christy a lot and he was genuinely happy for his friend.

Link was head over heels for her. Christy was everything he’d ever wanted in a woman and he could honestly say that he could see a future with her. She was beautiful, inside and out. He wanted a future with her, more than just about anything else in the world.

The sex with Rhett meant nothing. It’s not like he and Rhett were attracted to each other. They weren’t queer or anything. They just sometimes needed another warm body, it could be any body, to help them unwind and get off.

His first time, the first _real_ time, would be with her.

“Thanks, dude.”

* * *

A few months later, after they’d started their next year of college, the boys had moved in with Gregg, for no reason other than they really liked the guy. It was definitely not because they felt awkward around each other after everything that had happened.

It’s not like they couldn’t trust themselves.

At the same time, Rhett had begun dating Jessie. She was everything he had ever wanted in a woman and she seemed to like him just as much. She was younger and much shorter, but she was mature, smart, funny, tough and more gorgeous than any other woman Rhett had ever met.

The two couples soon became a close knit group, often going on double dates. They were practically inseparable.

With the two women on their arms, the taunts from the other men on campus had stopped. Everyone was growing up and the playground taunts had receded. No one questioned when they touched each other casually. No one batted an eye when they shared looks that seemed like they could read each other’s minds. It was a relief to be able to be free with their affections again, like they had as naïve kids.

The women found their closeness adorable, if a little baffling. They agreed that they wished they had a friendship like theirs.

But unlike when they were kids, the touching meant more now. Each time they sat together, across from the women they loved, bumping arms and legs under the table, the heat was ratcheting up. It felt like a secret, like a forbidden temptation and it was.

But it made it all the sweeter.

Rhett needed to get away and so he signed up to go overseas for a semester. Link had been unaccountably hurt by that, but outwardly he was excited for his friend. They had barely left their little part of the world. It was one hell of an adventure to travel to the other side of the world.

But Link was jealous and something else he couldn’t name.

The night before Rhett left, the four of them went out for dinner and drinks. The night soon disappeared as they joked and laughed and drank more than they should. The men dropped the women back to their homes and headed back to their own place. The silence in the car after the ladies were gone was heavy.

As soon as they closed the door behind them, they fell on the couch together. As they collided, their limbs tangled, tongues wrestled and clothes flew off.

It was quick and brutal, but they each memorised every second, trying to learn each other, the memories to keep them company when entire continents separated them. But still, their eyes remained sealed, no words uttered in the breath between them.

As they lay on Mr Fly, naked and sweating, Link gazed at Rhett, seeing him as if for the first or last time.

“I’m gonna miss ya, dude.” Rhett looked taken aback by the sincerity, but a shy smile tugged his lips up regardless.

“I’mma miss you too.” He planted another kiss on his friends’ lips, sweeter than ever before.

The guilt still lingered, but they ignored it, pushing it to the back of their minds, just drinking their fill of each other while they had the chance. The worrying would come while they were miles apart.

* * *

The distance was both a blessing and a curse. They needed space to think, to breathe, to cool off and to communicate only through email and letters, rather than the looks and touches which had become a large part of their vocabulary.

But the distance also proved how much they missed each other. Absence was making the heart grow fonder and it scared them.

Were they missing each other because they had been friends for so long, or was the yearning they felt something altogether different? It was a terrifying and confusing question, but regardless of the reason, the ache was strong and getting stronger.

The homecoming was much like the farewell. But this time was slower, exploring the changes that had occurred while they weren’t there to see it. It was a stark contrast, to see months of transformation. Usually they didn’t even notice the change, so used to the gradual everyday growing up. Their faces were as familiar to each other as their own reflections. Now they had lived separate experiences, and they needed to catch up.

This time, as they united, eyes locked, they whispered each other’s names, quietly, so Gregg wouldn’t hear from the next room.

Suddenly, the knowledge that it was _them_ made every sensation a thousand times more intense. They felt each other’s joy and pain for so long, sharing their lives. The time apart hadn’t changed that. Feeling this together was a feedback loop of rapture.

Until the shame kicked back in, dressing in a hurry, no more words exchanged. The separation should’ve cured them, but it had made them fall deeper into the abyss. Their immorality, their lust, was worsening and they could no longer pretend to themselves that it was nothing more than a physical release.

Link had planned his proposal carefully, for when Christy came back at the end of her summer vacation, just after Rhett got back from overseas. He hadn’t picked the ring yet, but everything else was in place, with parents’ permission granted.

Much like when Rhett was gone, the absence had shown him just how much she meant to him. He went to pick her up at the airport and before he knew it, he’d clumsily proposed. Thankfully, she had said yes and Link was the happiest man on the face of the planet.

When he told Rhett, he ignored the look of hurt in his eyes, focussed on the fake smile.

It wasn’t long before Rhett and Jessie were engaged too.

Life was changing for them, quicker than they could’ve imagined. They were suddenly working full time, about to get married to the amazing women they loved and were ready to start their new lives. The future looked pretty amazing.

And they tried to keep some things in the past.

* * *

It was time for Link’s bachelor party.

His dad was going to be his best man, as was the southern tradition, but his father wasn’t going the one organising the party. That task fell to Rhett, who knew that Link wasn’t the type for a crazy, drunken party out on the town, so he organised for only their closest friends to come hang out at Link’s house. It wasn’t going to be a big thing, but, as the first of their group to get married, they felt that they still had to farewell his single days in style.

They had some drinks, reminisced about their younger days and looked to the future.

At the end of the night, the other men slapped Link on the back, wishing him congratulations and commiserations in equal measure. Rhett stayed behind to help clean up, even though he knew that, on tonight of all nights, Link would probably want the order and comfort of his cleaning routine.

The men had thought they were over their ‘phase’. After all, it had been so many months since they had been intimate. Not since the night that Rhett had gotten back to America. And they were engaged men now.

But this was their last chance.

Link wanted a different type of comfort to soothe his nerves.

The bedroom light was left on as the made their way to the bed, hand in hand. They didn’t want to miss a single second of this, both knowing instinctively that this was the last time.

The feeling was bittersweet as the clothes were peeled off, slowly and reverently. They took their time, kissing, and feeling. Loving.

They explored each other in ways they never had before. Whispered words of comfort and adoration were shared. They got as close together as they could, trying to erase the worries and shame by drowning in each other.

When they came, they came together.

As they lay in the afterglow, still caressing each other, the reality hit them, harder than ever. But for once they didn’t let it pull them apart. They didn’t rush to get away. They stayed wrapped up together in Link’s bed, quietly wishing that time would stop.

“I’m so sorry, Link,” Rhett whispered, breaking the silence that had enveloped them.

“What for?” Link picked his head up from Rhett’s chest and gazed at him.

“For doin’ this to you, makin’ you feel like this. But mostly for not sayin’ nothin’ sooner.”

“It’s not your fault, bo,” Link lay his head back down on Rhett’s chest, listening to his heartbeat and absently running his fingers through his soft, blond chest hair. The old nickname made Rhett smile.

“You know I love you, don’tcha?” They’d said it before, when they were kids, too young and innocent to mean it as more than best friends. They hadn’t said it since they were teens, not since learning that the idea of two men loving each other, even platonically, was strange and to be feared. But they’d never stopped feeling it. Maybe it had changed through the years, or maybe they had, but now they knew it meant so much more.

“Yeah. I love you too.”

“I wish…”

_Things were different._

_We could be together._

_We weren’t eternally damned for feeling like this._

_You could stay with me forever._

Every ending to the sentence was lost, but each man felt them and knew the other felt the same.

* * *

The next day, Rhett watched as Link married the woman he loved. They say that a bride always looks her most beautiful on her wedding day. And Christy did look breathtaking.

But the serene calm that overtook the usually anxious Link as he stood at the alter was nothing short of ethereal, as the lights from the stained glass cast his features in a kaleidoscope of color and it made Rhett want to weep.

Link beamed as he said ‘I do,’ and when he smiled over at his best friend, Rhett smiled back just as easily.

Maybe in a different universe, things could have worked out. Maybe not. But right here and now, they couldn’t say that they weren’t happy with how they’d ended up.

They may not be together, but at least they had each other.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This bit is a stand alone story, but because it ends in a bittersweet place, I decided to write a second chapter for those of us who like to have a bit more closure.  
> I'll be posting the second part soon.  
> Title from the Duke Special song of the same name. His songs just seem to fit Rhink perfectly.


End file.
